Scott Schwarzhoff

Scott Schwarzhoff

Operating Partner, Unusual Ventures
About
I lead our Get Ahead Platform team here at Unusual Ventures. Our team has industry experts from Okta (yours truly) leading marketing services, MongoDB, and AppDynamics. Unusual was founded by Jyoti Bonsai, founder AppDynamics, and John Vrionis, fo......more

Content

Scott Schwarzhoff
Scott Schwarzhoff
Unusual Ventures (former VP PMM @ Okta) Operating PartnerFebruary 6
A couple to try out. Here’s a combined messaging source doc that I use every time I start working with one of our portfolio companies. Inherited from Citrix days and then adapted over time. Hope it’s helpful! The second one is one I've been working on for a year and am sharing with the Sharebi......Read More
5002 Views
Scott Schwarzhoff
Scott Schwarzhoff
Unusual Ventures (former VP PMM @ Okta) Operating PartnerFebruary 6
Posted this on another similar question, but on the competitive positioning point specifically, I think there's a 'turn' in the narrative toward the end of the story where existing solutions can't solve the problem completely and it's good to have specifics on how your solution is better. But you......Read More
3974 Views
Scott Schwarzhoff
Scott Schwarzhoff
Unusual Ventures (former VP PMM @ Okta) Operating PartnerFebruary 6
There’s basically one big one and that’s focusing too much on product/benefit and not enough on fitting the narrative into how a customer views their world, their priorities, and setting the table for the new world. There are all kinds of tools for salespeople to essentially become a consultative......Read More
2166 Views
Scott Schwarzhoff
Scott Schwarzhoff
Unusual Ventures (former VP PMM @ Okta) Operating PartnerFebruary 6
I've always been in the product team, so that's the most natural interaction for me. For PM, we'd collaborate on how to position new products. We built a spreadsheet that had product pillars>concepts>key features>'feature rank'>feature flags, price. You may be asking, 'what's a feature rank' a......Read More
2118 Views
Scott Schwarzhoff
Scott Schwarzhoff
Unusual Ventures (former VP PMM @ Okta) Operating PartnerFebruary 6
When I was at Okta, PMM was under the Chief Product Officer, so my peer was our head of product management. We had a ‘triad’ model of one PMM, one PM, and one TMM (tech marketing manager) per product for the first 8 years. That worked pretty well as the PM/PMM lead essentially owned the business ......Read More
1701 Views
Scott Schwarzhoff
Scott Schwarzhoff
Unusual Ventures (former VP PMM @ Okta) Operating PartnerFebruary 6
Lots of ways to do this, but there are 'tactical' and 'strategic' ways to measure success. Tactically, setting up metrics-based feedback loops in the go-to-market is key. We used Outreach in our SDR efforts that offers a great, low-risk way to quickly test messaging, we measured content performan......Read More
1547 Views
Scott Schwarzhoff
Scott Schwarzhoff
Unusual Ventures (former VP PMM @ Okta) Operating PartnerFebruary 6
Certainly when a new product has been defined, you want to get out and get a regular drumbeat of messaging feedback. When there are big new releases on features (eg: around the time of your annual keynote), it’s helpful to do a refresh. Or if a competitor has made a big move and you need to asses......Read More
1361 Views
Scott Schwarzhoff
Scott Schwarzhoff
Unusual Ventures (former VP PMM @ Okta) Operating PartnerFebruary 6
There is a classic fit in / stand out paradox that all companies have. On the one hand, most companies are improving on an existing way of solving a problem, there’s budget for that category, and therefore opportunity to pursue. It’s really, really expensive to create a completely new category as......Read More
1311 Views
Scott Schwarzhoff
Scott Schwarzhoff
Unusual Ventures (former VP PMM @ Okta) Operating PartnerFebruary 6
First thing, how are you segmenting the market and determining evolving customer needs/priorities? Great news - no product category stays fixed for very long. There’s always some new ’shift’ that the incumbent product category leaders don’t see coming that provides your company with a new busines......Read More
1167 Views
Scott Schwarzhoff
Scott Schwarzhoff
Unusual Ventures (former VP PMM @ Okta) Operating PartnerFebruary 6
Ah, a tricky one! There are a few things that you can do, starting with a core team that you trust to participate in the fluidity that is message development. Typically, this is a small group that can speak to all the core concepts that you need to discuss in detail. At Okta, this was our product......Read More
1164 Views
Credentials & Highlights
Operating Partner at Unusual Ventures (former VP PMM @ Okta)
Top Product Marketing Mentor List
Product Marketing AMA Contributor
Lives In San Francisco, California
Knows About Stakeholder Management, Category Creation, Competitive Positioning, Messaging, Produc......more